California Golden Bears Athletics
California
Penn State-Behrend
No. 2 Cal Set To Host MPSF Championships
11/16/2023 4:01 PM | Men's Water Polo
Bears 16-1 At Home Since 2022
2023 MPSF CHAMPIONSHIPS
FRIDAY, NOV. 17
NO. 2 CAL (19-4, 3-3) VS PENN STATE BEHREND (7-23, 2-4) | 1 P.M. PT
AT SPIEKER AQUATICS COMPLEX | BERKELEY
SATURDAY, NOV. 18
Cal vs. TBA | 2:45 P.M. PT (with win Friday)
SUNDAY, NOV. 19
THIRD-PLACE GAME | 11:15 A.M. PT
CHAMPIONSHIP GAME | 3 P.M. PT
TOURNAMENT PAGE
LIVE STATS
LIVE STREAM (OVERNGHT)
For the second year in a row, the No. 2 California men's water polo team is set to host postseason action at Spieker Aquatics Complex, welcoming seven teams to Berkeley for the 2023 MPSF Championships. The nation's top-four ranked teams will open things by facing off against their counterparts from the conference's D-III East division on Friday. Cal's likely opponent in Saturday's semifinals will be No. 4 Stanford, a team it owns a 2-1 record against this season. The Bears have a 16-1 home record since the start of the 2022 season.
BEAR NECESSITIES
SEVEN BEARS EARN ALL-MPSF HONORS
No MPSF team earned more All-MPSF First Team selections than Cal, which landed four and seven overall on Wednesday. Nikolaos Papanikolaou garnered his fifth consecutive first-team honor, while goalkeeper Adrian Weinberg and attackers Max Casabella and Roberto Valera joined him. Jake Howerton and Albert Ponferrada collected second-team recognition and George Avakian earned Honorable Mention status.
BEARS VS. THE MPSF
All four of Cal's defeats this season came against MPSF foes, with No. 1 UCLA defeating the Bears on three occasions. The Bears' first loss came to the Bruins in the MPSF Invitational Third Place game on Sept. 24, a contest which saw Cal tie the game after going down by four goals before eventually having its 15-game win streak snapped. It was the Bears' only loss of the season in which Papanikolaou and Weinberg both played.
The Bears ended the regular season with a convincing 12-8 victory over Stanford on Nov. 11. It was the first time since late September that Cal competed with its full starting lineup. The Bears also won an 18-17 overtime thriller over the Cardinal in the MPSF Invitational semifinals on Sept. 23, with Albert Ponferrada's game-winner sealing the highest-scoring meeting ever between the two sides. Stanford earned a 9-8 home win over Cal several weeks later.
The Bears also went 2-0 against No. 3 USC, completely dominating the Trojans on the road 12-5 in their MPSF opener on Sept. 9. Without Papanikolaou, Cal won a physical rematch 10-9 on Oct. 8 in the two sides' first meeting in Berkeley since last year's national championship game.
PAPA BEAR
After missing 10 of 13 games from mid-September to late October, Papanikolaou returned for Cal's final two games of the regular season. Despite the absences, the two-time reigning national player of the year set a record with his fifth All-MPSF First Team selection after leading the conference with 58 earned exclusions to go with 29 goals and 20 steals. His nine field blocks are also second-most on the team. Papanikolaou heads into the postseason with 239 career goals, just six shy of tying Johnny Hooper for No. 2 all-time in Cal history.
BRICK WALL
Weinberg, who also earned his fifth straight All-MPSF nod on Wednesday, ranks among the conference's best once again with 147 saves and 23 steals. Weinberg has reached double-digit saves on six occasions this season, including a season-high 15 against No. 4 Stanford on Sept. 23. At 929 career saves, he is currently three saves away from moving into the MPSF's top-3 all-time. Weinberg missed the Bears' final five games of October while competing in his fourth international tournament of the year for Team USA. He totaled 14 saves in five games while helping the American team win the gold medal at the Pan American Games, clinching a berth in the 2024 Paris Olympics. At 929 career saves, he is currently three saves away from moving into the MPSF's top-3 all-time.
SIZZLING SPANIARDS
Cal's junior All-Americans Roberto Valera and Max Casabella have been powering the offense from the perimeter, resulting in a team-leading 50 goals for Valera and 44 for Casabella. Valera – who was named the first MPSF Player of the Week of the season – leads the MPSF in both assists (55) and points (105) by a significant margin. At least one of them has recorded a hat trick in 16 of the Bears' 23 games, both tying for the team lead with 10 each.
HOME, SWEET HOME
Cal's only home loss of the season came in a 14-11 defeat against UCLA on Oct. 7, which was the first of seven straight missed games for Papanikolaou. Since 2022, the Bears are 14-1 at home against ranked opponents, outscoring them by an average of 4.3 goals per game.
STRONG SUPPORTING CAST
The 2023 Bears are made up of a highly experienced group of returners that includes eight fifth-year seniors and almost the entirety of their championship-winning starting lineup. Four of Cal's five All-Americans are back, with third-team selection Valera joining first-team returners Casabella, Papanikolaou and Weinberg. Sophomore Albert Ponferrada has been one of the most impactful players on the team this season, with his 47 assists and 32 goals ranking second and third on the squad, respectively, while his 28 steals lead the team. Juniors Jake Howerton (26 goals) and George Avakian (14) and sophomores Marci Szatmary (20) and Nik Mirkovic (17) have all seen increased roles. In all, Cal brings back seven of the eight players who scored at least 20 goals last season.
*2023 Cal Men's Water Polo Team Statistics
REPEAT SUCCESS
No men's water polo program has won more national championships than Cal, which claimed its 16th in 2022 in legendary fashion by coming back from four goals down over the final six minutes to defeat USC 13-12 in front of its home crowd at Spieker Aquatics Complex. Papanikolaou finished the game with seven goals and eight earned exclusions. It was the second straight year that the Bears clinched the title against USC by the same final score. Out of Cal's 16 championships, only two of them (1977, 2016) were not part of a back-to-back run. Only three times in NCAA men's water polo history has a team completed a three-peat, with the Bears doing so twice from 1973-75 and 1990-92.
ALL HE DOES IS WIN
Kirk Everist began his 22nd season as Cal's head coach fresh off his second straight national coach of the year honor – his fourth overall – and his record-breaking third consecutive MPSF Coach of the Year award. The USA Water Polo Hall of Famer owns an all-time coaching record of 455-133 (.774) and has won seven national championships at Cal, five coming as a coach and two as a player.
BEARS EARN NO. 1 PRESEASON RANKING
For the second straight year, the Bears began the season as the nation's top-ranked team, as Cal topped both the Collegiate Water Polo Association (CWPA) preseason poll and the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) coaches poll. This marked the fifth time since 2008 that the Bears started the year with a No. 1 national ranking.
BEARS WITH BRAINS
Excelling both inside and outside of the pool, the Bears hauled in numerous academic awards from the 2022-23 school year, including 15 ACWPC All-Academic nods – tied for the program's most since 2009. They also brought in nine MPSF All-Academic and Pac-12 Honor Roll honors, while individually, Jordi Gascon earned a spot on the College Sports Communicators (CSC) At-Large Academic All-District Team.
STAY POSTED
For further coverage of Cal men's water polo, follow the Bears on Twitter (@CalWaterPolo) and Instagram (@calmwaterpolo).
